Unique Expenses to Pet Food that Raise the Price

Many pet food consumers experience sticker shock when looking at the price of quality pet food. Why is it so expensive?

The UK website Mirror.co.uk recently published a story titled “Pet food costs 50 percent more than similar meals humans eat”. The story compared prices of canned meats for humans to similar pet food meats finding human food is often less expensive. I frequently hear from consumers wishing there could be affordable options of quality pet food. The cost problem of pet food boils down to two things – quality ingredients are expensive and pet food has additional expenses that human food does not.

Let’s start with the very basic – quality of ingredients.

With human food meat, as example, all meat available for human food is required by law to be USDA inspected and approved human edible. Meats are available in different qualities – such as Prime or Choice or Humanely Raised – but all meats for human consumption have been inspected by USDA and approved to be edible. With pet food, meats are not required to be USDA inspected and approved edible. The meat used in pet food is allowed to be “inedible” – also known as feed grade or pet grade. Needless to say, edible meats cost significantly more than inedible.

$1.15 per pound[/one_half][one_half_last]Pet Grade Meat
(also known as feed grade or inedible)

$0.22 per pound[/one_half_last]

Some pet foods use free range meats, graded meats (such as Prime or Choice), or humanely raised meats – which could easily raise the manufacturer price to $2.00 per pound (just for meat).

Meat would be the most dramatic difference in costs of feed grade to food grade, but the same significant price difference applies to each and every ingredient in a pet food that uses actual food ingredients compared to the price of feed quality/inedible ingredients.

Ballpark estimate, this is what it breaks down to manufacturer costs per pound of pet food for ingredients only (this is not manufacturing costs or any other cost – just estimated cost of ingredients – manufacturer estimated cost)…

Note: I’m being very generous with the cost of feed grade/inedible ingredients – as example, Walmart sells a 50 pound bag of Pedigree dog food for $0.46 a pound (retail). We can safely assume – with mark-up – the ingredients in this pet food cost the manufacturer an estimated $0.15 a pound.

Quality of ingredients aside for a moment, another expense unique to pet food is the cost to formulate a recipe. It’s fairly simple in human food. As example, if John Doe wants to sell frozen pizza, he finds a manufacturer and makes the pizza. But if John Doe wants to sell pet food, there are many nutritional requirements that need to be met. The pet food must contain particular levels of protein, fat, fiber, calcium, phosphorus, potassium, sodium, chloride, magnesium, and the list goes on for many more nutrients. So with pet food John Doe must hire a pet food formulator/nutritional expert to develop a recipe. This consultant charges upwards of $5,000.00 per recipe ($5,000.00 for one dog food formula and $5,000.00 for one cat food formula).

Next, using our John Doe pet food example, John has his recipe but now he must test the pet food to make certain it meets AAFCO nutrient requirements. Cost of complete laboratory testing for nutrient content (protein, fat, moisture, fiber, each vitamin analysis, each mineral analysis) – $2,500.00 per pet food. Several pet food manufacturers do full nutritional analysis on each and every batch of pet food they make, some test quarterly, some test yearly ($2,500.00 each testing of pet food). If John Doe would be selling frozen pizza instead of pet food, the nutritional testing is minimal.

Next, product packaging need to be designed and printed. This sounds simple enough, but nothing is simple with pet food. Unlike with human food – all of which falls under federal regulation – pet foods must comply with FDA, State and sometimes even USDA regulations. The bad news for a pet food manufacturer, not all regulations are consistent. As crazy as it might be, with pet food the font size must be just right on the packaging. Also the color of the font, or another example is if a parenthesis is used in the ingredient listing, and so much more is highly scrutinized by regulatory officials. They don’t care so much about waste meat in pet food, but they certainly care about font size on pet food labels. So another expert must be hired to design the pet food packaging to make certain labels meet all regulatory requirements costing another $2,500.00 per product. Again, if John Doe would be selling pizza instead of pet food, the packaging design would be much simpler due to consistent regulations of human food.

Another unique expense to pet food is state registration fees. In order for John Doe to sell his pet food, he must register each of his pet food labels in each state he sells in. John Doe pizza isn’t required to do this, only John Doe pet food. Below are the fees for states that charge a per label (per pet food product) registration fee…

Vermont – $85.00 per product per year.Maine – $100.00 per product per year.Rhode Island – $60.00 per product per year.New York – $100 per product per year.Maryland – $50 per product per year.West Virginia – $50 per product per year.North Carolina – $12 per canned pet food product per year, $40 per pet food in 5 # or less packages per year, $45 over 5# per product per year.South Carolina – $15 per product per year.Illinois – $90 per product per year.Minnesota – $50 per product per year.Iowa – $50 per product 10 pounds or less per year.Missouri – $25 per pet food sold in packages 10# or less per year.Louisiana – $40 registration fee per year, 50 products or less label fee of $10 per label per year, 51 to 200 $8 per label per year, more than 200 label fee $6 per label per year.Texas – $50 per product in 5# packages or less per year.Kansas – $25 per product 10 lbs or less per year.South Dakota – $50 per pet product per 2 years.North Dakota – $120 per product per 2 years initial, $100 per product per 2 years to renew.Montana – $50 per pet food per year.Wyoming – $20 per product per year.Washington – $90 per product in packages greater and less than 10 lb and $22 per product if only greater than 10 lb. per year.Colorado – $25 per product in packages less than 10 lbs per year.New Mexico – $2 per product per year.Utah – $55 per product per year.

Just to sell one pet food or treat product (10 pound bag or smaller) in these 23 states costs $1,172.00 a year. If a company manufactures/sells only 10 different varieties of pet food (only 5 cat foods and 5 dog foods) and 5 different treats – they are charged $17,580.00 a year just for the opportunity to sell in these 23 states. For a small company that doesn’t sell millions of pounds of pet food a month, this is a significant cost. And again this fee is completely unique to pet food/animal feed, human foods do not register with states and are not charged these additional fees.

And there is one more expense unique to pet food. If you buy John Doe’s frozen pizza at the grocery, take it home, cook it and discover it tastes terrible, do you return it to the grocery for a refund? Typically not – most human food consumers do not return a food because they don’t like the taste. They simply don’t buy that pizza again. But with pet food, consumers have the opportunity to return the food if the pet doesn’t eat it/doesn’t like it. While this return policy is great for consumers in one perspective, it adds on additional money to the actual purchase price of the pet food. I’m told a small manufacturer can have ‘the pet didn’t eat it’ product returns of $5,000.00 a month – which adds another $60,000.00 a year to the actual costs a manufacturer must base the sales price on.

All pet foods have the expense of formulating a recipe, laboratory testing a recipe, packaging/labeling costs, state fees and product return costs – which are almost totally exclusive to pet foods (not an expense to human foods). But not all pet foods have the added expense of using food ingredients. Remember, FDA and each State allows pet foods to be made from basically waste ingredients that cost pennies compared to food ingredients. Using the example explained above – food ingredients and high quality vitamins and minerals in a pet food cost the pet health conscious manufacturer (at least) 6 times more than the inferior quality ingredients they are allowed to use. Many of those same companies that purchase the highest quality ingredients test each and every batch of food – at additional expense they are not required to do – to make certain the pets consuming that food get the best nutrition possible. Add to basic cost of high quality ingredients distributor mark-up and retailer mark-up, and add the numerous expenses exclusive to pet food…quality pet food made from human grade ingredients with quality supplements is not cheap.

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Comment11

Marianne
Aug 19, 2015

Thank goodness our government is saving our pets from inconsistent or undesirable font usage. Keep the the comic sans size 14 at bay, but please proceed with the roadkill/already dead animals, “by-products” and God knows what from China! smh

It is SHOCKING what some of these companies are getting away with considering, especially China. Purnia is in major litigation considering. Millions of animals have died miserable deaths because of Roadkill & God only knows what esle including anti-freeze as ingredients to cat & dogfoods.

Thank you so much for this important information. We source only local, grass-fed or pasture-raised beef and poultry for our supplemental and customized pet food. Talk about sticker shock? Even we are surprised sometimes at the wholesale prices we pay for meat alone. Add to that locally sourced organic veggies and our food is — unfortunately — out of the reach of many people and pets.

Many people don’t know the reason this is the case, however. Large agricultural companies recieve billions of dollars each year in subsidies (also known as corporate welfare) to produce food cheaply and in mass. Local and organic farmers are not afforded such subsidies; they farm without such financial help or incentives from the government and taxpayers. The high cost of locally sourced food is the true cost of growing that food.

We recently experienced a situation that forced us to confront this ugly reality. We ran short on our beef supply because all the small, local farms had processed their small lots of cattle. We could have simply head over to the local cheap supermarket supplier of mass-produced beef but we refused; to do so would totally compromise our commitment to farmers and pet owners.

We know we are preaching to the choir, but it shouldn’t be this way. To us, however, the only path to change is to either eliminate subsidies for large agricultural corporations, or spread the wealth to small farmers who raise meat and produce ethically and sustainably.

To shorten the story: 6 mo dog adopted from Humane Soc. ribs showing along back, skin hanging on belly. Coat wretched. Two meds, one for mange. Said to be food motivated. Crazy dog, an adventure in living, but loved her madly, put her on organic food immediately. My food until I bought Honest Kitchen online. Took her off pharma meds, after googling them. Put her on home remedies. It took a full year of real food before her coat felt silky, but the people at the dog park were commenting on how good she looked in weeks, not months. She is stunning, and gets goodies that are probably less than wonderful, but no sugar at least ingredients. Loves red sauce. Loves meat loaf. Oh, yeah, changed to Honest kitchen base mix. Rest of her food is except for a few cookies, organic, pastured. One of her meals costs probably half of one of ours. No meds, except flea and heartworm combo, because we live in an open house, or do I anticipate any even down the corridor of the years. She’s sleek and beautiful, highly active, now two years old. Chub mackerel is next to tuna in the grocery store. Pastured eggs, our dinners. Boy, is she active and smart with a mind of her own. We’ll be about 85 at the end of her life, after which I’m looking forward to adopted an old dog or two or three.

Full disclosure here, I did not read this entire article. It started off well, but my eyes glazed over somewhere after Susan mentioned that the font size on the packaging has to be JUST RUGHT!!!!
(Sorry I used all caps for that, but heck, it ain’t a pet food label!!!!)

The idiocy of the font correctness on labels just blows my mind. And of course, part of why I couldn’t finish reading the article is because I was pet sitting for someone, and the only thing her elderly, medicated cat could (would???) eat was two flavors of the Iams brand of cans called “purrfect” something-or-other. I tried to read the ingredients on the can, but the font was so small and squished that I could not read it. Well, these cans are sold on a box (something like 24 cans in a box). I figured, OK, I’ll read the ingredients on the box. Surely, with all the room they had on the carton, there would be room to print the ingredients so that they could actually be read.

Nope!!!! The ingredient list on the carton was the same tiny squished up jumble of nonsense the same size that was on the can.

Oh, it just now dawned on me that according to this article, the font HAD to be the same size on the box as it was on the can.

Nevermind the fact that it was impossible to read . . . Oh, maybe that was the point of the font selection?!?!?!

This is just ridiculous. I have reached the point in my comment that I am just at a loss for words.

I used to feed my kids Merrick/Castor & Pollack foods due to the quality. Now that they are owned by Purina, the food has gone down hill. My dogs shed like crazy once again, are constantly hungry, and I had to fight with them to eat. SO after realizing I spent $130/wk on their food, I began looking for alternatives. I decided the best course of action was to prepare their food myself. I have cut my food costs down to $15/wk ( I catch chicken legs/thighs on sale for $0.39/lb-$3.90 for a 10# bag, I stock up!) including powdered vitamins I mix in with their meals. I make everything from chicken and rice/noodles/vegetables to steak/potatoes/veggies). The advantage? All HUMAN GRADE food! And I have NO issues with them eating. Not to mention they are full longer (eat less), not shedding near as bad (I have a Rott/Shepard mix and a boxer), they are more energetic, and seem to be healthier once again. I will NEVER go back to “pet” food, even “premium/super premium” brands. I know what my kids are eating and can eat it right with them, sans the vitamin powder. If you really want your animals to eat healthy and not be concerned about the ingredients, prepare their food yourself. It also gives you a voice by using your money NOT buying what these companies offer.

Well said, James, and exactly my sentiments and how I feed my babies. It took me 7 yrs to figure out why my most recently adopted (7 yrs ago) pet kept shedding SO much until I took her off mass manufactured dog food. I even eat healthier since I feed both of my dogs the same food I eat. More and more people are waking up to realize the solution to healthier pets.

I’m with James — the cheapest way to feed well is to buy fresh. I’m probably lucky in being able to source delicacies like fresh tripe and salmon heads locally, but foods such as chicken parts, lamb breast, liver, etc. are relatively easy to come by.
It is good, though, to know that not all petfood companies take a murderously reckless attitude to what they put in their products, and it’s illuminating to see what different planets the profit margins are on. Thank you as ever, Susan, for your eye-opening research.

Something to think about as well… there is no way to prove that the “high end / more expensive” brands actually put in human grade meat or fresh meat for that matter. So you could be paying for something you are not getting when paying extra for these brands. You can’t tell whether a pet food contains chicken meal, turkey meal, poultry meal or fresh chicken or turkey or whether it is human grade or not. When you buy bison or wild boar dog food they almost always have beef or pork in them as well so how much of the fancy novel protein are you actually getting? There is no test to distinguish. And since there is no regulation governing pet food manufacturing (in Canada) who is watching over them?